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Vodafone trials 20Mbps mobile broadband speeds
Tuesday 17th February 2009, by Daniel King
Vodafone has reached another significant breakthrough in the evolution of mobile broadband by demonstrating speeds of more than 20Mbps in tests.
Earlier this year, the company revealed that it had successfully trialled its HSPA+ 64QAM technology, achieving 3G data connections of up to 16Mbps.
Now Vodafone has gone one better during testing of the HSPA+ MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) connection on its Spanish network, allowing the firm to further boost its network performance.
The operator currently offers broadband speeds of up to 7.2Mbps, which is among the fastest on the market, but the latest breakthrough could help raise service speeds.
Vodafone global networks director Andy MacLeod said: "Breaking the 20Mbps peak speed barrier in tests through HSPA+ MIMO is yet another key milestone in the evolution of 3G mobile broadband technology and raises the prospect of higher network performance for our customers in selected hotspots."
The test results would also help the company to "derive even more value" from its current 3G infrastructure and offer a better quality service to existing users.
MIMO technology could play a major part in the rollout of high-speed broadband across the UK, as it has been proved to enhance network capacity even in dense urban environments.
Vodafone claims that this could make it especially useful in hotspots such as airports or business districts.
The trial comes after research by Analysys Masons revealed that the total number of broadband connections across Europe will reach almost 150 million by 2014, which could see mobile services begin to outnumber cable and DSL-based connections.
Categories: Vodafone
